> Martin Carthy > Songs > Sovay
> Dave Swarbrick > Songs > Sovay
> A.L. Lloyd > Songs > Sovay, the Female Highwayman
> Anne Briggs > Songs > Sovay

The Female Highwayman / Cecilia / Sovay

[ Roud 7 ; Master title: The Female Highwayman ; Laws N21 ; Henry H35 ; Ballad Index LN21 ; VWML CJS2/10/2685 ; Bodleian Roud 7 ; GlosTrad Roud 7 ; Wiltshire 561 ; DT SOVAY ; Mudcat 18026 ; trad.]

Timothy Walsh of Devonport, Devon sang Sylvia to Peter Kennedy on 5 April 1060. This BBC recording 26310 was included on the anthology Fair Game and Foul (The Folk Songs of Britain Volume 7; Caedmon 1961; Topic 1970).

Martin Carthy sang Sovay in 1965 on his first album Martin Carthy. A slightly different version of Sovay is on the 1983 album Brass Monkey, re-released in 1993 both on the CD The Complete Brass Monkey and on his anthology Rigs of the Time, and in 2003 on the Martin Carthy anthology The Definitive Collection. A live recording with Dave Swarbrick at the Folkus Folk Club in 1966 is available on Both Ears and the Tail, another one—recorded at Focal Point, St. Louis, Missouri in 1990—is on their album Life and Limb.

Martin Carthy noted on his first album:

Sovay Sovay was a great favourite among country singers and was printed by Such, among others, under its alternative title of The Female Highwayman. Her name varies from place to place—Sovay, Silvy, Shilo, Sally, etc. —but the story remains the same being a rather involved and slightly chancy way of establishing her lover’s good faith. The tune sung here was collected by Hammond in Dorset and slightly altered rhythmically by Bert Lloyd giving it a somewhat Balkan lift. The text is collated from various versions.

This video shows Martin Carthy and Dave Swarbrick on the Australian TV programme “Tonight Live” on 22 January 1990:

A.L. Lloyd sings a very similar version (same tune, slightly different words) of Sovay, the Female Highwayman on his 1966 album First Person. This was also included, for example, on the CD reissue of Bold Sportsmen All and in 1994 on his Fellside anthology Classic A.L. Lloyd. He noted:

Another girl who dressed in men’s clothes, high-spirited this time to a dangerous degree. The heroine of this piece has been called “the kinkiest girl in folk song”. It’s not quite clear whether her name is really Sylvie or Sophie, but of her forthright and adventurous character there can be no doubt. Lucy Broadwood found this “an exceedingly favourite ballad with country singers”, and every collector of prominence has found versions of it. The good Dorian tune here is akin to the one Sharp published to the words of The Flash Lad (he called it The Robber) in his Somerset series, Vol. V, and is substantially the same as H.E.D. Hammond’s Sovie tune from Long Burton, Dorset. In a couple of places I’ve added a pinch of spice to the rhythm which seems to me to suit the character of both the song and its heroine.

Pentangle sang Sovay in 1968 on their second Transatlantic album, Sweet Child, and Bert Jansch sang it in 1980 on his album Thirteen Down.

George Dunn sang The Female Highwayman in 1971 to Ewan MacColl and Peggy Seeger. This recording was included in 2002 on his Musical Traditions anthology Chainmaker. Roy Palmer noted:

Under various names, including Priscilla, Zillah, Sylvia, Sovay, Sovie and Cecilia, our female highwayman tests her true love’s allegiance in a song with a soppy scenario but a good tune which commanded widespread admiration for a couple of centuries. Almost all Roud’s 62 examples are from southern England—but I also collected a version from one J Francis, from nearby Castle Bromwich, Warwickshire, in 1974. There are only two other British recordings of this song known to Roud; by Timothy Walsh, of Devonport, and Mabs Hall, of Billingshurst, Sussex.

George, who had no title for the song, initially remembered a substantial fragment, and eventually the full text.

Anne Briggs recorded Sovay in 1973 but the ensuing album was shelved, only to be released in 1996 as Sing a Song for You. She noted:

Other people have minutely psychoanalysed this song, so I won’t! Just to say it’s an amusing exchange of gender roles—“it made him blush like a rose” when he realised that he’d been had. But “she’d have pulled the trigger and shot him dead” if he’d blown it. Strong stuff.

Isla St Clair sang Sovay on her 1981 BBC television soundtrack album The Song and the Story.

Mabs Hall sang Cecilia to John Howson or Mike Yates in the 1980s. This recording was included in the 1990s on the Veteran Tapes cassette of traditional singing in Sussex, Ripest Apples, and in 2008 on her and her son Gordon Hall’s Veteran anthology As I Went Down to Horsham. John Howson and Mike Yates noted:

Most Victorian broadside printers, including Pitts, Catnach, Disley and Such, all of London, Lund of York, Wright of Birmingham, and Stenton of Cheltenham, called this Silvia’s Request and (Young) William’s Denial. One unknown printer used the title Sylvia’s Cruelty to Her Kind Lover, while Magee of Belfast simply called it Sylvia. It was once extremely popular in southern England often under the title The Female Highwayman (there are seven versions in Cecil Sharp’s collection) and many versions have turned up along the eastern seaboard of Canada and America. Mabs learned her version from her father, and it was one of her favourite songs. Gordon also enjoyed the song and he can be heard singing it on Good Things Enough.

Gordon Hall sang Cecilia in a private recording in 1994 that was included in 2001 on his posthumous Country Branch album Good Things Enough.

Liliana Bertolo, Evelyne Girardon and Sandra Kerr sang Sove in 1997 on their Fellside CD Voice Union.

Pete Morton sang Silvia on his 1998 Harbourtown album Trespass. He noted:

Sexy woman seeks man who likes horse riding and dressing up. Must remain faithful even when looking down the barrel of a gun.

Benji Kirkpatrick sang Sovay in 2005 on the Fellside anthology of English traditional songs and their American variants, Song Links 2, and Jeff Davis sang the related American variant Pretty Sylvia.

The Witches of Elswick sang Sovai in 2003 on their first CD Out of Bed. They noted:

Becky [Stockwell] and Fay [Hield] have sung this for years, albeit a couple of hundred miles apart, and forced Bry[ony Griffith] and Gillian [Tolfrey] to sing it at gun point in true highway woman style. They got it right in the end.

Emily & Hazel Askew sang Sovay in 2005 on their first WildGoose CD, Six By Two. They noted:

This is a great song about a woman trying to find out if her lover is worthy enough to marry. I wonder if he did marry her after this… she’s certainly not for the weak hearted!

Rubus sang this song as Cecilia in 2008 on their CD Nine Witch Knots. Emily Portman noted:

Cecilia, disguised as a highwayman, holds up and threatens to shoot her boyfriend as a test of his loyalty. Some may see this song as celebrating a feisty feminist before her time; but it could also be seen to tread a fine line between militancy and madness. This version comes from the singing of Mabs Hall of Sussex (Ripest Apples, Veteran VT107) who leaves us to make our own minds up about the lovers’ fate.

James Yorkston & The Big Eyes Family Players sang Sovay in 2009 on their Domino album Folk Songs.

Isambarde sang Sovay on their 2010 CD Telling Tales.

The Outside Track sang Silvy Silvy, “from Helen Creighton’s collection of songs from New Brunswick”, in 2010 on their CD Curious Things Given Wings.

Steve Roud included The Female Highwayman in 2012 in The New Penguin Book of English Folk Songs. Lucy Ward, James Findlay, Bella Hardy and Brian Peters sang it a year later on the accompanying Fellside CD The Liberty to Choose.

GreenMatthews sang Sovay on their 2013 CD A Brief History of Music 1260-1915.

Hannah Sanders and Liz Simmons sang Sovay on their 2013 EP World Begun.

Danny Spooner sang Sovay on his 2013 CD Gorgeous, Game Girls. He noted:

In folksongs it’s usually the male who uses a disguise to test the fidelity of his sweetheart. In this song, however, the situation is reversed and one is left wondering whether she would have carried out her threat had he handed over the ring.

Andy Turner sang Sovay as the 21 April 2013 entry of his project A Folk Song a Week, and returned to it in 2017 on Magpie Lane’s CD Three Quarter Time. They noted:

Sovay was collected in 1911 from William Pratley of Ascott-under-Wychwood in Oxfordshire, by Cecil Sharp. [VWML CJS2/10/2685] . Mr Pratley was also a Morris dancer, and was one of Sharp’s sources when collecting the Ascott-under-Wychwood Morris dances. Our arrangement starts with a processional Morris dance from Wheatley in Oxfordshire called, reasonably enough, The Wheatley Processional.

Laura Smyth sang Cecilia on her and Ted Kemp’s 2017 CD The Poacher’s Fate. They noted:

Tales of women cross-dressing occur frequently in traditional folk song. By adopting men’s clothing the woman is liberated, becoming an active character in the story. In Cecilia the woman tests the loyalty of her sweetheart. Laura learned this song from the fantastic larger-than-life Sussex singer and gin drinker, Gordon Hall. Whilst not using the same vocal mannerisms, Laura hopes that she has captured some of the spirit of Gordon’s performances.

Rachael McShane sang Sylvie in 2018 on her Topic album with The Cartographers, When All Is Still. She noted:

This version of The Female Highwayman or Sovay was one of the first songs we put together as a band. I’d just bought a viola and was enamoured by the sound of the open strings, so that became the opening of the arrangement. Sylvie disguises herself as a highwayman to test her lover’s loyalty and bravery. She sounds like the ultimate bridezilla to me, he’d be better off out of it.

Melrose Quartet sang Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer to the tune of Sovay in 2019 as part of their Rudolph Variations.

Varo sang Sovay in 2020 on their eponymous first album, Varo. They noted:

We first heard this Suffolk song on Anne Briggs’ album Sing a Song for You. It tells the tale of a woman who decides to test the love of her man by dressing as a highway robber and attacking him in a valley to attempt to steal the ring she had given him as a keepsake. From the very beginning we have been interested in songs told from a female perspective and this particular song grabbed our attention straight away. The woman in the story is a very strong character, as opposed to the more common scenario in which the woman is portrayed as a powerless victim who is either betrayed or abandoned by a man.

Bird in the Belly sang Sovay on the 2023 anthology Sing Yonder 1. They noted:

We based our interpretation of this song on the singing of Martin Carthy which was adapted by A.L. Lloyd. Production wise, we punctuated the song with lush romantic flute solos to [hopefully] invoke images of Sovay riding on horseback on the plains.

See also The Male Female Highwayman on the Kipper Family’s 1984 album Since Time Immoral.

Lyrics

Martin Carthy sings Sovay

Sovay, Sovay all on a day,
She dressed herself in man’s array
With a sword and pistol all by her side
To meet her true love, to meet her true love, away did ride.

As she was riding over the plain
She met her true love and bid him stand:
“Your gold and silver, kind Sir,” she said,
“Or else this moment, or else this moment, your life I’ll have.”

And when she’d robbed him of his store
She said, “Kind Sir, there is one thing more:
A golden ring which I know you have,
Deliver it, deliver it, your sweet life to save.”

“Oh that golden ring a token is;
My life I’ll lose, the ring I’ll save.”
Being tender-hearted just like a dove,
She rode away, she rode away, from her true love.

Now next morning in the garden green
Just like true lovers* they were seen;
He spied his watch hanging by her clothes
Which made him blush, made him blush, like any rose.

“Oh what makes you blush at so silly a thing,
I thought to have had your golden ring;
’Twas I that robbed you all on the plain,
So here’s your watch, here’s your watch and your gold again.”

“Oh I did intend and it was to know
If that you were me true love or no.
So now I have a contented mind
My heart and all my heart and all my dear is thine.”

* Martin Carthy pronounces it loviers or lovyers.

Brass Monkey sing Sovay

Sovay, Sovay all on a day
She dressed herself in man’s array
With a sword and a pistol all by her side
To meet her true love, to meet her true love, away did ride.

And as she was a-riding over the plain
She met her true love and bid him stand;
“Your gold and silver, kind Sir,” she said,
“Or else this moment, or else this moment, your life I’ll have.”

And when she’d robbed him of his store
She says, “Kind sir, there is one thing more:
A golden ring which I know you have,
Deliver it, deliver it, your sweet life to save.”

“Oh that golden ring a token is:
My life I’ll lose, the ring I’ll save.”
Being tender-hearted just like a dove,
She rode away, she rode away, from her true love.

Oh next morning in the garden green
Just like true lovers they were seen;
Oh he spied his watch hanging by her clothes
And it made him blush, made him blush like any rose.

“Oh what makes you blush at so silly a thing,
I thought to have had your golden ring:
It was I that robbed you all on the plain,
So here’s your watch, here’s your watch and your gold again.”

“I did intend and it was to know
If that you were me true love or no.
For if you’d have give me that ring,“ she said,
“I’d have pulled the trigger, I’d have pulled the trigger, and shot you dead.”

A.L. Lloyd sings Sovay, the Female Highwayman

Sovay Sovay all on a day
She dressed herself in man’s array
With a brace of pistols all at her side
To meet her true love, to meet her true love, away she ride.

As she was galloping on the plain
She met her sweetheart and bid him stand:
“Stand and deliver, young man,” she said,
“If’n you do not, if’n you do not, I’ll shoot you dead.”

He delivered up his golden store
And still she craved for one thing more:
“That diamond ring that I see you wear,
Oh hand it over, oh hand it over, and your life I’ll spare.”

“From me diamond ring I wouldn’t part,
For it’s a token from me sweetheart.
Shoot and be damned, you rogue,” said he,
“And you’ll be hanged, and you’ll be hanged for murdering me.”
She being soft-hearted much like a dove
She turned her horse and she rode away from her true love.

Next morning in the garden green
Young Sophie and her love were seen;
He spied his watch hanging by her clothes
Which made him blush, lads, which made him blush like any rose.

“Why do you blush you foolish thing,
I thought to have that diamond ring.
Twas I who robbed you all on the plain
And here’s your gold, love, and here’s your gold and your watch and chain.”

“I only did it for to know
Whether you were a man or no;
If you had given me that ring,” she said,
“I’d have pulled the trigger, I’d pulled the trigger and shot you dead.”

George Dunn sings The Female Highwayman

Shiloh, Shiloh, one day, one day,
She dressed herself in man’s array;
With a sword and pistol by her side
To meet her true love, to meet her true love away did ride.

She met her true love on the plain,
“Stand and deliver, sir,” she said,
“Stand and deliver, sir,” she said,
“Or else this moment, or else this moment I will shoot you dead.”

He stood and delivered of his golden store.
She then cried out, “There is one thing more.
There’s a diamond ring I know you have:
Deliver it, deliver it your dear life to save.”

“The diamond ring was given by my love
Was a token of our own true love.
To deliver it would not be right,
So I’ll keep the ring, I’ll keep the ring if you take my life.”

Next morning in the garden green
Just like two lovers they did meet.
He saw his watch hang down her clothes,
Which made him blush, which made him blush like any rose.

“What makes you blush, you silly thing?
It was I that wanted your diamond ring;
It was I that met you on the plain,
Oh take your watch, on take your watch and your gold again.

“I only did it for to know
Whether you were my true love or no,
But now I have contented mind:
My hand and heart, love, my hand and heart, love, and all is thine.”

And now this couple married were,
And they did live a happy life.
The bell did ring and the music play,
And they got pleasure, and they got pleasure both night and day.

Mabs Hall sings Cecilia

Cecilia on one certain day
She dressed herself in man’s array,
With a braise of pistols all by her side
To meet her true love, to meet her true love,
To meet her true love away did ride.

She met him boldly on the plain.
“Stand and deliver,” she said, “ young man.
Stand and deliver, young man,“ she said,
“Or else this moment, or else this moment.
Or this very moment your life I’ll lay.”

She robbed him of his watch and gold.
Gave him the empty purse to hold.
Saying, “There’s one thing more on your finger now.
Deliver it to me, deliver it to me,
Deliver it to me, your life to spare.”

“That diamond ring a token was,
Before I’d loose it my life I’d loose.”
She being tender hearted, more like a dove,
She rode away, she rode away,
She rode away from her own true love.

Early next morning, plain to be seen,
That couple walked on the garden green.
When he saw his watch hanging by her clothes
Which made him blush, which made him blush,
Which made him blush, like the damask rose.

“How can you blush at such a thing,
More if I’d had your diamond ring.
For it’s I that robbed you, upon the plain.
Now take your gold love, now take your gold love,
Now take your gold love and your watch again.”

The Witches of Elswick sing Sovai

Sovay Sovay all on a day
She dressed herself in man’s array
With sword and pistols down by her side
To meet her true love, to meet her true love, away did ride.

She met her true love all on the plain
She stepped up to him and bade him stand:
“Stand and deliver unto me
“Or else this moment, or else this moment I’ll shoot you dead.”

He gave her all his golden store
But still she said, “There is one thing more:
A diamond ring, sir, I’ve seen you wear;
Make haste and give it, make haste and give it, your life I’ll spare.”

“This diamond ring is a pledge of love;
My life I’ll lose before the ring I’ll give.”
Being tender-hearted just like a dove,
She turned around, she turned around and left her love.

One day after these two were seen
Walking together in the garden green,
He spied his watch hanging by her clothes
Which made him blush, made him blush like any rose.

“What makes you blush so silly a thing,
I fain would have had your diamond ring.
It was I who robbed you down on the plain
So here’s your watch, love, here’s your watch and your gold again.”

“I did it just for to know
If that you were a true love or no;
But if you’d have given me that ring,” she said,
“I’d have pulled the trigger, I’d have pulled the trigger and shot you dead.”

Laura Smyth sings Cecilia

Cecilia on one certain day,
She dressed herself in man’s array,
With a brace of pistols all by her side
To meet her true love, to meet her true love,
To meet her true love away did ride.

She met him boldly on the plain,
“Stand and deliver,” she said, “young man,
Stand and deliver, young man,” she said,
“Or else this moment, or else this moment,
Or else this moment your life I’ll lay.”

She robbed him of his watch and gold,
Gave him the empty purse to hold.
Saying, “There’s one thing more on your finger now:
Deliver it to me, deliver it to me,
Deliver it your life to spare.”

“This diamond ring a token was,
Before I’d lose it I’d lose my life.”
She being tender hearted, more like a dove,
She rode away, she rode away,
She rode away from her own true love.

Now early next morning plain to be seen
This couple walked on the garden green,
When he saw his watch hanging by her clothes
Which made him blush, which made him blush,
Which made him blush like the damask rose.

“How can you blush at such a thing,
More if I’d had your diamond ring.
For it was I who robbed you upon the plain,
So take your gold, love, so take your gold, love,
So take your gold, love, and watch again.”

“Why did you enter such a foolish plot?
Suppose your pistols you would have shot,
And if you had killed me out on the plain,
Forever after, forever after,
Forever after you’d be brought to shame.”

“I did intend and ’twas to know
Whether your love it was true or no.
But now I have a contented mind,
My love and all, my love and all,
My love and all, dear, they are thine.”

So this couple married were
And they do live a most happy pair.
For the bells do ring and the music play
And they have pleasure, and they have pleasure,
And they have pleasure both night and day.